


lay my head down

by redlightofdawn



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Fluff, Geralt is a tired boy, M/M, Sleep Deprivation, Witcher secrets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-12 08:34:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28507524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redlightofdawn/pseuds/redlightofdawn
Summary: A Geraskier Holiday Exchange for @StonedGeralt. Sorry this is late, and I hope it was worth the wait!_Humans believe Witchers don't need sleep to survive. Geralt was taught he should keep them thinking that way.He wasn't taught what to do about someone like Jaskier.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 16
Kudos: 439
Collections: Geraskier Holiday Exchange 2020





	lay my head down

**Author's Note:**

  * For [stonedgeralt](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=stonedgeralt), [stonedgeralt](https://archiveofourown.org/users/stonedgeralt/gifts).



> Max asked for Geralt repeatedly falling asleep on Jaskier. The muse made me get there in a bit of a roundabout way, but I hope I got somewhere you enjoy, in the end :)

If there was one thing the Continent did not lack, was rumours about Witchers. 

The supposed presence of horns, hoofs and humongous appendages all featured among the most popular tales about the monster hunters - and also some of the wrongest, as anyone with working eyes who had ever met a witcher could point out.

Others, however, were harder to prove. Or disprove.

The idea that the process that made a witcher also took a human’s normal need for sleep was a commonly held belief. Just how much - or how little, if any - sleep one did need was subject of much speculation. Geralt had had aldermen scoff as his requirement of board as part of his payment, citing that sleep was an unnecessary luxury for witchers; had curious farm children repeatedly check on him in the middle of the night when he accepted an offer of a barn or hayloft for the night; had been told by an Oxenfurt professor, and very haughtily so, that he’d read an account from the previous century describing an apothecary's travels with a witcher companion who, if the journal’s author was to believed, had not slept once during their two seasons of travelling together, needing nothing further than a few hours of meditation a week.

The professor had been particularly interested in the supposedly miraculous trance; he wasn’t the first, and wouldn’t be the last.

Geralt had demurred, citing a code of conduct and guild secrets, feeling, not for the first time, jealous of this - supposedly more monstrous, but with so many other perks - counterpart of his that existed in the world of human rumours.

He was probably going to go spend the night in the arms of a group of sorceress, engaging in passionate, relentless and ruthless - but unattached and unemotional - passion, to then return to his castle filled with riches and dark magic, where he drank werewolf blood from a human skull.

Real Geralt was going to grind his teeth and noncommittally hum along to the idiot’s attempts to get him into a lab - that would quickly turn into a cell, no doubt - for as long as he could, so as to have a reason to leech off the fire and free beverages in the university hall, before he had to go bother roach for a spot in her stall.

Not _quite_ the same.

There was one thing this particular rumour that set it apart from most others.

No, it wasn't _true_ \- Fate hadn't ever been quite that kind to Witchers - but, unlike the vast majority of false rumours, it hadn't been started by this who feared and misunderstood and hated them.

No, that one was created and maintained by Witchers themselves. 

The first Witchers had quickly learned it wouldn't do to let humans know they periodically let themselves be so vulnerable.

As for the truth…. A Witcher could go days without sleep, yes. So could a human. Whether either would be sane at the end of it was up for debate.

Geralt not only needed, but enjoyed, sleep. During winter, he cherished the days when the snow fell so deep that training was cancelled and he could sleep in as much as he wanted, luxuriating in the warmth and thick furs and knowledge he would have warm and plentiful food for the foreseeable future.

On the path, he made do with less, as he was taught - they had to keep up the fiction, Geralt had been taught, and keep themselves vigilant, sleep on the Path could never be deep. Five hours a night, he had learned, was enough to keep him spry and his senses sharp. Any less, and after a few days it would start to wear on him, dull his senses, slow his reaction time, unless he took the time to meditate.

Despite what irritating professors seemed to think, the meditation Geralt had been taught from infancy and practiced regularly was not that different from the kind employed by those who worked with chaos or at the old temples. It wasn't particularly magic or miraculous, and certainly didn't replace sleep. An hour or two would push exhaustion away, clear one's perception of all disturbances brought on by their body, such as pain, a need for rest, nourishment, or even to relieve oneself. 

One paid the price for it, however.

Shouldn't surprise people, and yet. 

Geralt was particularly intimate with the consequences of pushing oneself too hard, with too little sleep, for too long, as insomnia and nightmare prone as he had always been, not to mention single-minded and stubborn. The potions he took to do his job, in that regard, were a blessing and a curse. 

There were many mechanisms through which the many concoctions Geralt had been taught to prepare and employ took effect - unsurprising as their uses were as varied as the number of recipes he could prepare. But, in general, most, in some level or other, worked together with the mutations to allow a witcher’s organism to produce, release and employ massive amounts of physical energy and, to a smaller degree, chaos. That was what permitted his muscles to work untiringly and at their maximum, his body to heal and protect itself in most varied ways.

It was, unsurprisingly, exhausting. And once the potions ran out, it was lights out, forcing him into deep, if nonrestorative, sleep once they ran their course. If he timed things right - and, nearing a hundred, Geralt usually knew how - his energy reserves would last enough for him to obtain a trophy and collect his payment and then make it back to camp in time to pass out. When things didn’t go quite as well, that time went into either taking another dose that would allow him to push himself even further or into downing some Swallow before passing out amidst monster entrails and allowing his body to mend itself.

The crash - for he could describe it in no other way - was deeply unpleasant and potent when mixed with continuous lack of rest. The closest he could liken it to was a sickness he had caught as a youngling, before the trials. Sickness was rare in Kaer Morhen - Witchers neither caught nor spread disease, and the trainees who hadn't undergone the trials rarely had contact with outsiders. But a boy had been brought with a sleeping sickness, that only made itself known after he'd been in the keep, sleeping with the others and aiding in the kitchen, for a few days already.

The keep had been ill suited as a hospital; the instructors and masters had done all they could, but the sickness was unknown, and the Witchers unused to handling so many sick children at once.

The Mage, Geralt remembered hearing later, had deemed the issue beneath his notice.

A handful of boys had died, including the first. Geralt had thought he would, too, his body aching and _hotcoldhot_ and his stomach rolling and eating himself at once, that when he had managed to stay conscious. But he had - _arguably_ , Lambert would point out - been one of the lucky ones and survived. 

But if he stuck to his routine, he managed to avoid such situations, mostly.

Until Jaskier had come along, and refused to go away.

To begin with, passing out amidst entrails wasn’t an option with the bard dogging his every move. The bard had been horrified to find Geralt unconscious beneath an Endrega warrior corpse once - and Geralt had been horrified to have almost exposed his kind’s vulnerability to such loose lipped and unpredictable individual.

Luckily, Jaskier had believed poison had been the cause for Geralt’s passing out, and Geralt had made sure to give Jaskier a snarling scolding for following Geralt after promising to stay at camp.

He’d have to create a new routine. Going to sleep once the bard was already out and waking first was already a practice he had perfected, having been taught it as a child, still, as Vesemir impressed upon them the importance of keeping the normal sleep needs a secret in case they had to travel with a non-witcher companion.

That strategy, of course, wasn’t meant to be a long term thing; witchers weren’t supposed to _have_ long term companions.

So Geralt had had to get creative.

He got pretty good at sneaking hours of sleep when Jaskier was otherwise engaged, greedly snatching every opportunity for a nap while the bard played in taverns and inns; it wasn’t hard to hide, all he had was give Jaskier the impression he wasn’t particularly taken with his music and rather spend the time doing something productive.

He also meditated frequently, often taking the opportunity to go off on a hunt earlier than he needed to, so he could take a couple hours and be sharp when time came to face whatever creature he was being paid to exterminate.

Of course it couldn’t last forever.

***

Geralt blinked forcefully against the lazy trails of light glinting across his sight, despite how ineffectual the tactic had been the last 20 times he tried it.

By his side, Jaskier was talking a mile a minute, as was his usual, but Geralt paid it even less attention than usual. 

All his focus was taken up with putting one foot in front of the other.

He didn’t think Jaskier had noticed anything amiss. He had commented on, but eventually accepted, that Geralt could be even more taciturn that usual after a hunt. Jaskier had mused aloud, more than once, that perhaps the taking of life, even when justified, was a weight upon Geralt’s shoulders.

Deep down, Geralt didn’t disagree, but in those moments, he was mostly fighting the weight of his eyelids. 

The hunt had been a particularly tricky one - the young, unmated griffin had been extremely fearful, natural protective instincts no doubt increased tenfold by the insidious presence of the opportunistic neuroparasite that had caused the griffin’s attack upon the village that had hired Geralt. That had meant stalking out the creature’s lair for two days, nearly motionless, waiting for its hunger to overcome its fear. 

When the Griffin had finally come close enough for Geralt to attack, it had hardly been the debilitated creature Geralt had expected; the psychosis the parasite induced made the Griffin’s attack unpredictable and unrefined, and it threw itself at Geralt with a rage the witcher had rarely seen before.

He’d taken the beast down, in the end, but not before having to take an extra dose of Tawny Owl and White Raffard’s to keep himself going. His toxicity was over the safe threshold, he knew, and ideally he knew he should have poured himself some White Honey the moment the fight had been over.

But then, without the stamina afforded by the potions, he would crash instantaneously.

And he couldn’t let Jaskier see that. 

They had been traveling together on and off for years at this point, and though he trusted Jaskier’s intentions, Vesemir’s voice echoed in his mind whenever he considered explaining the truth to Jaskier, remembering that this deception kept numberless witchers in relative safety from humans when they had to stay in their settlements. 

Geralt swallowed down a wave of nausea, and blinked forcefully again, to no avail. He wondered how far they still were from their camp, his space and time perception consumed by the haze of toxicity.

He tried to think what he was going to do one they made it there, but his brain didn’t want to comply.

Usually, hiding his post potion fatigue was easy enough. For the more unsavoury monsters, the ones that would require alchemical help, Jaskier would usually be waiting at the inn or tavern, plying his trade, and all Geralt would have to do was spare enough energy to make his way straight to their room and pass out. Jaskier was used to Geralt skipping out on his performances - which meant he still pouted and complained, but had stopped expecting Geralt to actually change his ways - and by the time the bard made it to their room, if he did at all, Geralt would be sufficiently rested to wake and affect meditation, and the bard, usually drunk, on alcohol or company, hardly paid him any attention.

Geralt usually only allowed Jaskier along when the hunt was relatively quick and harmless - nothing that would require all his energy - and as such he usually had no trouble waiting for the bard to fall asleep to do the same.

In what he hoped was a discreet manner, Geralt shook his head as if trying to dislodge the mental fog that engulfed his mind, and pressed his eyes closed one more time.

***

Jaskier observed the sleeping Witcher with a nearly clinical eye.

Something had clearly been up with the witcher, though Jaskier had, for once, decided not to press, disturbed by the sight of the stumbling, barely coherent Geralt, clearly trying to pretend everything was fine.

Geralt’s actions once they finally arrived at their camp solidified Jaskier’s suspicions. He had grunted away Jaskier’s noises about dinner, and sat against Roach’s saddle, clearly intended on removing and cleaning his armour, only to promptly pass out.

Jaskier had run over, worried blood loss from some hidden wound had been the cause, only to be greeted by a loud snore upon pushing on Geralt’s shoulder.

Didn’t need to sleep Jaskier’s classically educated bardic _ass_.

He’d since maneuvered Geralt into a somewhat more comfortable position, tugged away what he had been able of the witcher’s armour, and covered him with one of their thickest blankets. It wasn’t a particularly cold night, but Geralt’s skin had been clammy to the touch.

His mind was racing as he watched the witcher sleep on, though it had already been hours since his collapse. 

Jaskier knew that Geralt _did_ need sleep, no matter what stupid peasants and even stupider so called speciallists seemed to think. As an oxenfurt alum and connoisseur of the night life offered from the slums of Novigrad to the poshest Cintran court, Jaskier held a deep, first hand knowledge of sleep deprivation. He had noticed the signs upon the witcher’s face and actions from the beginning of their acquaintanceship. But Geralt was a private, taciturn man that didn’t take kindly to Jaskier prodding and questioning on the subject.

So Jaskier had done what he did perhaps not best, but pretty well, and snooped.

Using a tactic he’d devised as a child interested in doing things his parents frowned upon, Jaskier made sure to down a skinfull of water and some tea, to be sure, before going to sleep that night, and to not go to the bathroom beforehand. As usual, Geralt had made no move to go to sleep (though he did own a bedroll, and probably thought JAskier hadn’t noticed) even as Jaskier put out the fire and wished him goodnight.

A few hours later, Jaskier had awoken to a screaming bladder and a sleeping witcher. After a quick trip to the woods to take care of business, Jaskier returned and, upon the lightest feet he could manage, approached Geralt. And, sure enough, the witcher didn’t stir or tell Jakier off, but continued as he had been, with all the clear signs of sleep - the deep breaths, twitching eyelids, the slightly parted lips.

Carefully, had Jaskier made his way back to his own bedroll. 

The next morning, Geralt was up before Jaskier, and, as always, there were no signs he had slept at all - even the grass where he had slept, Jaskier noticed, had been carefully mussed up to hide it’s flattening from a casual eye.

For once, Jaskier had decided not to pry. Melitele knew how old Geralt was, and he clearly had kept himself alive this long. But now, watching the clearly exhausted wither sleep on, he revisited his stance. 

And he made a plan. 

***

Geralt had planned for things to go back to the way they had been. Jaskier had seen, he _thought_ he knew, but Geralt had been up before the bard the next morning, and hadn’t confirmed or denied anything - though, truth be told, Jaskier had been strangely quiet on the subject. If he was diligent about it, the bard eventually would think it was a fluke, or forget about it. 

Then maybe Geralt wouldn’t have to admit to Vesemir that he had let their closely guarded secret slip in front of the continent’s most loud mouthed bard. 

His incipient hope didn’t last long, however.

No matter his resolve, it was like the floodgates had been opened; Geralt found it harder and harder keeping to his routine of only sleeping when the bard couldn’t see, whether because he was asleep himself or otherwise engaged with playing and wooing and whatever else Jaskier did. 

Jaskier’s presence had started to signalize a lot of things Geralt wasn’t quite ready to admit, recently-

_(-things like comfort and safety and warmth and-)_

-and suddenly if it was like that was increased tenfold. He found himself with heavy eyelids as they sat around camp at night, the smell of sweet herbs in the air as Jaskier prepared some fancy herbal brew, found himself nodding off as he rode roach, Jaskier playing a for once soothing melody at his side instead of excitedly blabbing on.

Geralt wasn’t sure how much of that Jaskier had noticed. He had been considerably curious about Geralt’s lack of sleeping when they first started travelling together, but had since dropped the subject, undoubtedly due to Geralt’s refusal to entertain the topic. 

He started to get suspicious, however, the day Jaskier woke him - Geralt hadn’t even noticed himself slipping, lulled by the rhythmic sound of Roach’s hooves and Jaskier’s complimenting humming, the vibration of his voice a engulfing physical sensation on Geralt’s back, where Jaskier’s chest was pressed up against him - and didn’t even make a joke about the fact Geralt had fallen asleep atop his horse in broad daylight.

It all came to a head one late autumn night.

The air felt chilly on Geralt’s exposed skin even as he fed the fire. Soon he’d have to start making his way towards Kaer Morhen if he wanted to get there before the pass closed with snow. He felt a sad tug at the idea; Jaskier and him had been travelling together uninterrupted for an unprecedented amount of time, the entirety of summer and autumn so far, and the idea of not having the bard at his side for a whole season sat badly with him, even as he yearned for the rest it would afford him.

“Geralt?” Jaskier called out, from under the pile of blankets near the fire. There was a strange note to his voice, but Geralt couldn’t place it.

“Hm?” Geralt asked, forcing irritation out of voice and his stiff hands to continue to clean his already clean balde. He was hopping Jaskier would fall asleep soon so he could also he into his bedroll, but if the bard was feeling chatty, then that didn’t seem much likely.

“I’m cold,” Jaskier replied, ignorant of Geralt’s inned turmoil.

“I find that unlikely,” Geralt said, trying to keep a check on his envy.

“Would you mind - that is, could you perhaps-,” Jaskier began, and Geralt’s impatience won off.

“Out with it. What do you want?”

“Get in here with me?” Jaskier asked, sitting up. Geralt could now see his face, and that he looked nervous, his lip being tugged nervously between his teeth.

Geralt froze.

“Body heat, you know. Best way to warm oneself up.”

Geralt took another moment, watching the entrancing view of Jaskier, hair ruffled and cheeks pink, holding the blankets back in clear invitation.

He shouldn’t. It was a horribly idea, for many reasons, Geralt reminded himself, as he got to his feet and put his sword away.

Taking his armour off was harded, with his stiff, now trembling fingers, but, thankfully, Jaskier waited in silence, unmoving, as Geralt did it.

Jaskier’s body felt like a furnace, when Geralt lay next to him.

He didn’t know how to place himself - there was enough room, which niggled at the back of his mind, but he couldn’t focus on it, not when he was busy holding himself stiff so he wouldn’t touch the bard inadvertently.

“Oh, for pity’s sake,” Jaskier huffed, tugging on Geralt’s shoulder. He let Jaskier manhandle him to his heart’s desire, until the bard had his arms around Geralt, a leg over his hip. The herbal smell of the tea Jaskier had taken to brewing nightly - but never seemed to drink - flooded his senses, mixed with Jaskier’s own pleasant, clean scent. 

It was far too comfortable. 

“Good?” Jaskier asked, his voice a low murmur against Geralt’s ear. The warmth was almost painful where it tawed Geralt’s extremities and flooded his body, loosening his muscles and adding weight to his eyelids.

Geralt hummed his ascent, trying to ignore how he sounded much more pleased than gruff.

“I get it,” Jaskier continued, causing Geralt to frown despite the relaxation that was taking over his body despite his best efforts. “The world isn’t kind to you.. Witchers have to protect themselves. But Geralt, you can trust me.”

“I do,” Geralt replied, quickly, though he wasn’t sure what they were talking about. It surprised him to realise it was true - despite the fact that Jaskier could be silly and brash and inconsequential, Geralt would have trusted him with his life.

The warmth that flooded his chest as Jaskier’s arms tightened momentarily around him was harder to ignore. 

“So please,” Jaskier said, voice almost overcome with an emotion couldn’t, wouldn't name. Not yet. “ _Sleep_.” 

Geralt felt a shot of adrenaline chase away some of the lax feeling threatening to overcome him. Jaskier’s arms tightened around him again, much more firmly this time, upon feeling Geralt stiffen up.

“I get it, I worked out - humans are dangerous to you. And sleep is vulnerable. But I swear Geralt - I can keep a secret.”

Geralt found himself snorting, despite the storm of emotions inside him.

He was surprised to hear Jaskier hum consideringly, the musical sound vibrating against his back. 

“I understand your hesitation - but my handler was sure of it. Standard training, you see, and he _was_ one of Redania’s topmost spymasters.”

Geralt turned to look at Jaskier, despite how close that put their faces together. He could only make out calm and a mysterious smile.

This close together, there was no way Geralt could have missed the telltale hitch in Jaskier’s heart at a lie. 

Not, he realised, that he ever _had_. Noticed Jaskier lying, that is.

He starred as Jaskier, speechless.

“Like I said, I was well trained,” Jaskier said, with a smile and, after a flash of emotion that he seemed incapable to hold back, he brought his face even closer to Geralt’s face, never breaking eye contact.

Slowly, giving time for Geralt to move back if he so wished, he lay a soft kiss upon the corned of Geralt’s lips; fleeting, but enough that Geralt could tell Jaskier’s lips were soft, even where he could still see marks of his earlier tugging. 

“I can keep a secret,” he repeated, almost sadly, with weight, clear blue eyes searching Geralt’s own for a reaction.

 _Oh._

Before he knew what he was doing, Geralt closed the distance himself, a press of lips no longer than Jaskier’s own had been, but, hopefully, enough to impress Jaskier with the words he couldn’t quite say.

It lasted enough for Geralt to feel Jaskier’s mouth curve into a smile under his.

For once, the bard seemed speechless, taking Geralt’s face in his warm hands and pressing their foreheads together.

Geralt breathed in slowly, simply sharing air with Jaskier, a smile tugging on his own lips.

“Sleep?” Jaskier finally asked, after a long moment.

Geralt merely burrowed his face into Jaskier’s neck, and nodded.

He’d need the energy. The two of them would have a long trip until Kaer Morhen. Maybe after meeting Jaskier, Vesemir wouldn’t mind so much Geralt had let their secret slip.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you all have a lovely end of year and we all get a much better 2021 :)


End file.
